


Robed in Angelic Splendor

by mamafaerie



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Aziraphale is a celestial being of love, Comfort, Gen, HIV/AIDS Crisis, Hospice, Internalized Homophobia, OC death, faith - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-04
Updated: 2020-01-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:28:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22118674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mamafaerie/pseuds/mamafaerie
Summary: He was not strictly speaking supposed to make friends with the humans, but he had always loved them. Especially the bohemians, the avant garde, the artists and theatricals. People on the edges of their own worlds.There were fewer of them everyday. Young and vulnerable and many of them outcast and not figuratively. Literally, cast out of their loving homes.don’t think about it, don’t question who they remind you of with those longing eyes that seem to tell you of Before.Aziraphale knew one thing: an angel wasnotsupposed to need an outfit for funerals.
Relationships: Aziraphale (Good Omens) & Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 34





	Robed in Angelic Splendor

**Author's Note:**

> I was reminded recently that more gay men died of AIDS just in in New York in the decade between 1980 and 1990 than all the American casualties in Vietnam. I have wanted to write a fic about the AIDS crisis for some time, but it didn't seem to fit anything I was creating. With Aziraphale's penchant for living in gay areas, frequenting a particular gentleman's club and the way he owns that he is 'THE Southern Pansy' fully claiming the slur thrown at him, I believe he has always been a 'friend of Dorothy' as we used to say when I was growing up. Regardless of the fact that this celestial being isn't specifically a 'gay man', being neither a human male nor necessarily attracted to them, he has clearly embraced queer culture and though he has the choice to present in any way he wants, this is how he chooses for the world to see him. 
> 
> I like to think of him giving comfort and a sense of God's love back to his chosen community, to those that the government and their own families had often abandoned. 
> 
> I had attended more funerals by the time I was a teenager than most people have to see in a lifetime. Many family friends died in the AIDS crisis. I also volunteered in an AIDS hospice throughout high school, doing everything from serving meals to sitting and talking with patients, to restocking medical supplies for the nurses, or making phone calls to potential donors, and doing filing. It was hard making friends with people and losing them a few months later, but I treasured the work and hopefully it was important to the men and women I got to know. Though my OC does not represent any particular friend or their lives, I did choose his name to honor some of those I knew.
> 
> Thanks as always to Merindab (janto321) for betaing.

The hospice had a feel of home in the common areas, but the scent of hospital. Antiseptic and cleaning supplies as such healing houses tended to these days, but underneath it he could still smell the bitter tang of illness, decay. These fragile forms gone somehow rotten, which had always lingered in doctor’s quarters and battlefields, even more prominent in all the places that those rejected by society dwelt. This place seemed like all of that and more.

It shouldn’t be like this. Humans had gotten very good at medicine and hygiene. Of course they were still mortal, but usually not too many died in the grand scheme of things before they found a way to treat or even cure new diseases, especially ones this widespread.

Aziraphale stood outside the doors. He took a moment to steele himself. He had to do this. To enter this place, to smile, to try to bring light to their darkness. But that didn’t change the fact that his friends came here to die. 

He was not strictly speaking supposed to make friends with the humans, but he had always loved them. Especially the bohemians, the avant garde, the artists and theatricals. People on the edges of their own worlds.

There were fewer of them everyday. Young and vulnerable and many of them outcast and not figuratively. Literally, cast out of their loving homes. 

_don’t think about it, don’t question who they remind you of with those longing eyes that seem to tell you of Before._

Aziraphale knew one thing: an angel was _not_ supposed to need an outfit for funerals.

It wasn’t heaven’s doing, though everyone seemed to claim so.

It wasn’t hell’s either, though it certainly felt like it. 

It must have been pestilence, but this was too much. Enough that Aziraphale felt a burning on his tongue, a need to ask Her why She has allowed this? Why a whole generation was living in terror of a simple draw of blood, a test result? A death sentence. 

They were his friends.

The Plan was unknowable. That’s the whole point. She could see what no other being can see. But how could this be part of it? And why did he question now? He’d survived unscathed through the Flood, through that business in Egypt, and golgotha, and several rounds of plagues and witch trials. How was this the thing that made him question? 

He knew the answer and he did not like it.

 _they’re like me, these ones who love fiercely and brightly, in defiance. They cannot help who they love either._ It felt earth shattering to even think it. Of course he loved. He was a being of love. And yet thinking of Crowley at all these days gave him the same feeling as being asked the whereabouts of his flaming sword. 

He arrived at the room. The nurse nodded her head, assuring him he could go in. They were used to him by now. 

The shrunken deathmask faces of his friends, so recently plump and full of life was nearly unbearable. Bob was positively unrecognisable today. His heart was still the same. And his smile. They’d just shared shared wine and song and now this... He’d been in and out of the hospital before, but this was real. This was final. This was something Aziraphale couldn’t miracle away. 

Karposi’s sarcoma remind Aziraphale of nothing so much as the black death. And really, it might as well be. 

Long before he met Aziraphale, Bob had been kicked out of his house, kicked out of his church. And here at the end, Aziraphale was his only visitor. The others who had come with him or stopped by on the other occasions had passed now, or in a couple cases, were in hospital themselves. 

There was an aching loneliness that permeated this sad hospital room. Aziraphale had tried to cheer it up with a bright tartan swag over the window in Bob’s favorite turquoise shades and today he’d brought a vase of flowers. It didn’t help much. 

Bob was asleep when he’d first arrived, but he woke to find Aziraphale reading in the chair beside the bed. 

Bob reached out for his hand. After a few minutes in silence, just holding on, Bob gave a gentle squeeze. “I think this is it, Azzi,” he said. “I’m not getting out again.”

“Don’t talk like that,” Aziraphale said softly. He couldn’t disagree with the assessment, but he needed hope. They all did.

The suffering, the abandonment was never part of Her plan,was it? Occasional side effects, yes, but surely not a part of it.

Bob grimaced more than smiled. “You know it. I know it.” He paused to cough and Aziraphale brought the cup of cold water up, holding the straw to his lips to make it easier. After swallowing with effort, Bob went on, “I’ve been thinking a lot. Things they’re saying on television. Things my mom said years ago. Do you, do you think it’s true? Is God punishing me for being. You know, like I am?”

Aziraphale drew a sharp breath. Bob seldom said the word ‘gay’ and couldn’t manage it now, even though more than half the men on this floor were gay, too. “God is most certainly not punishing you.” Aziraphale drew himself up to perfect posture and entoned, “Robert Enrique Emory, you do not deserve this.”

Bob’s eyes grew wide and Aziraphale realized he had put at least a little celestial splendor into his tone. 

“You sound so certain,” Bob breathed, then winced and launched into a coughing fit again. 

“I am,” Aziraphale said, helping with the water again, but before he could get any further in his assurances, a nurse bustled in. 

“Visiting hours were over ten minutes ago.” Lauren was always a dear. She smiled at them both. “I’d let you say your goodbyes and all, but this one has some tests and then has to show me he can keep dinner down or I’m going to have to start something more substantial on this line. And you don’t want me to have to intubate, right, love?”

“I’ll come by tomorrow,” Aziraphale promised, kissing his cheek. _Surely they had to at least have tomorrow._

He brought an antique book of psalms, with a few choice verses marked. Bob had been Catholic once, after all. For good measure he’d also gotten a copy of Kushner’s _When Bad Things Happen to Good People_ , because the rabbi did have a point. 

Bob was awake when he arrived, propped up in bed, and writing letters. 

“Feeling better today?” Aziraphale practically chirped, kissing both his cheeks in greeting.

Bob managed an actual smile. “A bit. You?”

“Getting on just fine, my dear.”

Bob handed a small stack of letters over. “Would you get these out for me?”

“Of course. What are they?”

“Even if they think I headed for the devil a decade ago, I still think they should know. Family.” Bob shrugged.

“I’ll send whatever you’d like to whomever you tell me. You haven’t, though, you know.”

He smiled weakly. “Gone to the devil? Yeah, I heard you yesterday. You still believe. Did you grow up in the church? We’ve never talked about it.”

“Oh, I’ve always felt close to God.” Aziraphale managed, which was certainly the truth. 

“I loved it as a kid. The music, the prayers. The scent of the candles. I didn’t love the suit or the little wafers, but sitting there, knowing that God was watching out for me, to feel that love meant a lot.” Bob swallowed. “Before they decided I was unclean.”

Aziraphale set aside the books and letters and clasped Bob’s hand in both of his. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“It’s so long ago. I just, I just keep hearing the things they said about me. Or to me.” He sighed, “I wish I could know for sure that they aren’t right.”

Aziraphale glanced from the door to Bob and back again, then nodded his head decisively. He snapped his fingers and it clicked quietly closed. The room grew slightly darker for a moment, then shimmered and where Aziraphale had stood there was a gust of wind from six sets of wings unfurling, each glowing with their own light and at least a hundred eyes blinking open. 

“You are loved.” Aziraphale said and his voice held within it the ringing of bells and the clashing of cymbals.

Bob blinked against the brightness and his mouth opened, but he couldn’t speak. Aziraphale was just glad his monitors weren’t off the charts. Actually, after a small initial spike, Bob’s heart rate was more even and peaceful. 

Aziraphale let Love pour into the space, filling the room as surely as his angelic splendor, then grew surprisingly flustered for all that unfurled glory. “Well, that was a bit excessive. Sorry. A bit carried away. I think I was supposed to throw a ‘be not afraid’ in there.” he said with a chuckle. “Now you know why we tend to say that. Sorry. Haven’t had much call for that form down here,” he said, somehow folding in on himself to look once more like his usual cheerful, middle-aged bookseller self. 

“You’re an…”

Aziraphale nodded. “Yes. And I can assure you disease just comes with the mortal form. I’ve seen enough of it over these past millennia. But I also know that you are loved and cherished and I’m here for you. It’s going to be all right, Bob. There will be an end the suffering. You will find peace.”

“Are you my guardian?”

“Oh heavens, no. This is better. I’m your friend.”

Bob, still looking, understandably awed, smiled. 

“Now, then. I think I could talk Lauren into bring you a cup of tea if you’re up for it.”

It was only a week later. Bob had fallen asleep while Aziraphale was reading. 

Death entered and, though he did shed a tear, Aziraphale did not try to stop them. He kissed Bob’s hand then waved goodbye. Watching him disappear into the light. In his millennia amoung humans, he'd rarely watched this part, but it seemed right to stay and send Bob off properly. 

The monitors went off and the staff bustled in. Aziraphale was taken out, but he knew it had all been over before they arrived.

As he was walking down the corridor to the exit, Lauren came to him. “I have something for you.” She handed him a canvas.

Aziraphale let out a strangled sob at the sight. Bob hadn’t painted in over a year. He’d been an artist and set designer, but he'd never used the art room at the hospice. 

“He called last week for someone to bring over a canvas and his oils," Lauren said. "It’s pretty out there, but I’d never seen him so happy as when he was working on it. He could only work for an hour or so at a time before he tired out. Sometimes less.” Lauren said. “And he always had us hide it before you came, but he wanted you to have it.” 

Aziraphale had never seen a mirror in that form before. He wondered if he really did have that gilded glow, if all of his eyes blazed that bright azure. It was breathtaking. “Thank you,” he said as much to Bob as to the nurse standing before him. 

It was strange to feel at once so heavy and so light, a curious mixture of joy and loss. He hugged Lauren and thanked her for all her work. 

Bob had not been the first nor the last that Aziraphale sheltered through this journey. No one else needed quite the ethereal vision Bob had been allowed to see. There were others he held and patted, those who he read to quietly when they wanted to hear one of the classics one last time, or a favorite poem. My, how Aziraphale had blushed through Ginsberg. He tried his best in small ways to alleviate their pain, their loneliness. To let them know that though the world had cast them off, he was there for them. 

To make sure they knew that She loved each of them just as they were.

**Author's Note:**

> I treasure all comments. If you liked this, please let me know, as it feeds my muse.


End file.
